Designer Ted Boerner blends rustic with modern

Ted Boerner traces his design sensibility to a 150-year-old log cabin in Wisconsin, where he lived with his parents and grandparents as a child before moving to Milwaukee. The rough-hewn cabin, with its midcentury-modern furnishings, became the family's getaway, and it set the stage for Boerner's career as a furniture designer.

"You'll find the seeds of my ... design sense in that cabin," Boerner says at his San Francisco studio. "As long as I can remember, I've loved the juxtaposition of rustic and modern."

After studying figure-drawing and working in theater as a costume and set designer, Boerner decided his real calling was to create furniture. The first piece he recalls designing for a client was a brightly colored dining room table, inspired by the Memphis Group furniture of the 1980s.

The San Francisco design studio Ted Boerner, Inc. keeps one of their signature pieces, the Harvest Table, at their office Wednesday, July 10, 2013 in San Francisco, Calif.
(Karl Mondon/Bay Area News Group)

"I've continued to design for that couple through the years," he says, "and I'm just now revisiting that first table and expanding it to accommodate the changes in their life."

Boerner continued to custom-design individual pieces for specific projects but was working primarily as an interior designer until he met Frank Pontes, a marketing specialist, at a social gathering. Not long after, the two decided to launch Ted Boerner, Inc., to create a whole custom line of furniture.

The line made its debut in 1993 at the International Contemporary Furniture Fair in New York with four pieces, including the still-popular Crescent Bed. The overwhelmingly positive response surprised them both.

Advertisement

"When the Rockwell Group ... ordered 250 chairs to use in their hospitality projects, we decided this might work," Pontes says. As for why Boerner's work had such immediate appeal, he says, "Those early pieces had a midcentury feel that was familiar -- like furniture people had grown up with -- but they also had a freshness to them."

Today, Boerner designs can be seen in the corporate offices of Nike, Conde Naste, Celebrity Cruise Lines, San Francisco's Hotel Rex and New York's Gotham Bar and Grill, among other locations. Signature pieces such as the Library Chair are at Stanford, Harvard and Wellesley, as well as in the homes of individuals.

Boerner also creates upholstered pieces for Design Within Reach and cabinet hardware for Rocky Mountain Hardware. Locally, his line is available at De Sousa Hughes in the San Francisco Design Center. His hardware is sold at E.M. Hundley Hardware, also in San Francisco.

These days, Boerner enjoys reinterpreting his popular classics as well as creating entirely new pieces with new materials. One of the ways he's revitalizing some classic designs is by adding height and movement. For example, he felt that his Skoop Chair was too heavy. He wanted it to appear to "float"; it's now available with a metal stem base that allows it to swivel, as well as with the original wooden legs. Similarly, the Nocturne Bed, with its heavy side rail, is now elevated to give it a lighter feel.

"Good design comes from a need to change or fix or repair," Boerner says. His current "fixes" include designs that are looser, more colorful and less wood-centric than in the past. "I have a sign posted in the studio that says 'No More Wood,' to remind me to move away from some of the designs that have defined us."

Ted Boerner and Frank Pontes founded Ted Boerner, Inc., 20 years ago and one of their earlier logo designs of a chair still graces their front door Wednesday, July 10, 2013 at their offices in San Francisco, Calif.
(Karl Mondon/Bay Area News Group)

Recent offerings such as the Thicket Tables, inspired by the branching patterns on the Tod's Leather Goods building in Tokyo, are made entirely of metal and glass. The Reverie Cabinet, inspired by industrial windows Boerner sees on his way to work, features painted or image-backed glass. The colors and images can be customized but also are offered in Boerner's selected colors or with images of the natural grasses that surround his Anderson Valley home.

"I've always been interested in organic shapes and patterns, as well as architecture," he says. His Cloudbox Sofas and Ottomans feature abstract Cumulus and Nimbus tufting, inspired by the Watercube aquatic center at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.

Boerner says he admires the way Asian cultures embrace both traditional and contemporary design. For an early interiors project with designer Candra Scott, Boerner designed furniture for the Manhattan Hotel in Tokyo. His iconic Cello Chair was developed then, and it remains a best-seller a quarter-century later. Bay Area residents can see it in use at San Francisco's Hotel Rex.

His pieces are manufactured in California, Amish country and Japan, so Boerner gets to experience Japanese aesthetics firsthand. "The Japanese have a way of 'being' while creating the furniture that shows respect to the materials, the design and the maker," he says. "That's very appealing to me."

Both Boerner and Pontes talk about applying the same principles of intention and respect to their work at the San Francisco studio. "Beyond creating original designs with great quality, we think it's essential to give really good service," Pontes says. "We say that we care ... about the buyer, the product and what happens between the two down the road. That's why we get a lot of repeat business."

Boerner recently encountered a satisfied customer at a gym, who told the designer that he and his wife have owned the Gardener Chair for years, and that it is one of their family's favorite pieces -- so much so that they have to fight with their children to sit on it.